Speak
by Fictatious
Summary: Serpentine 'Verse. By popular demand, it's the story of boy-meets-ghost. Six years before the start of the final battle, Bakura Ryou's father gives him a souvenir from Egypt.
1. Lesson One: Take candy from strangers

"_I have a reservation. The name is Bakura."_

"_Let me see... Ah, yes, Mister Bakhura, here it is."_

...

Bakhura's eyes snapped open. He gasped for air and threw his arms and legs out, struggling and writhing in the darkness. He choked and screamed, twisting round on himself. It wasn't exactly pain he was feeling, it was moreso an incredible intensity, his being completely unprepared to be so violently thrust back into existence.

He screamed again and clawed at the ground forming below him, the hard shape of bricks and the sliding abrasion of sand sifting into shape under his fingers. Bakhura quieted, panting and gathering his fingers around a handful of sand, staring at the stone-brick that was pouring itself into walls around him, raising around him a large, empty and dark cell with a narrow stairway leading up to the one door, twice his height above the floor.

_Welcome back_, a not-voice hissed.

Bakhura scrambled up to his hands and knees and cast around wildly for the not-voice, his eyes soon landing on a massive, black snake coiled in the center of the room, its head raised up and burning red eyes staring back at him. "S-Sek," Bakhura whispered, feeling weak suddenly and sitting down heavily.

_You were out for a long time, Bakhura,_ the snake whispered and uncoiled, sliding across the floor, around Bakhura, part of the long, fluid body coming to rest over his lap, and put its face nose to nose with him. _It's been about three thousand years_.

"Th... thousand?" Bakhura repeated, not quite understanding.

_The new Pharaonic line moved back to the old capitol, and all the memories of you and Kul'elna were buried over with sand. You were lost to time._ Sek explained. _But the vessel carrying the Lost Pharaoh's soul has finally chosen a host. The time has come to resume our game._

Bakhura stared back into Sek's smoldering eyes and after a moment made a few sounds, as though trying to form a word and forgetting it halfway through. "Ha- un- ff-f- y-y-yu- Sek w-woke me?" he finally managed to stammer.

_No. And I can't wake you if you slip from this world again. You must find the one who woke you quickly,_ the snake instructed, and began moving again, sliding off of Bakhura and making an arch across the floor, toward the center of the room, his head twisting back to look at Bakhura expectantly. _Quickly. Find the one who did it._

Bakhura climbed to his feet, his legs trembling and unsure below him, and staggered over to Sek. "B-b- d-don't- I don't know..." he said helplessly.

Before Sek could answer that another not-voice, very different from Sek's, drifted through his prison.

_...er Bakhura, I hope you..._

The not-voice faded into a soft, almost inaudible mumble that Bakhura realized he'd been hearing since he became aware of himself. "My name..." he whispered, staring upwards, where his cell faded into darkness before any ceiling could be made out.

_Find him_, Sek instructed.

He nodded slowly, and lifted his hands, not quite aware that he was doing it, toward the darkness above. The room began to tremble slightly as he tried to concentrate his scattered mind on _finding._

...

Rattling. Metallic and coming from the alter chamber.

Shadi drifted into the room and looked down at the alter. The spines of the Millennium Ring had lifted out of their grooves and were shaking and rattling against the stone around them.

"... What do you want?" Shadi asked softly, knowing the Ring wouldn't answer him so easily. He stood still for a few more minutes, watching the curious movement, before crouching down and lifting the Millennium Ring out of the alter.

Once it was in his hands, the Millennium Ring's spines all turned themselves in the same direction, pointing. Shadi gazed in the direction they were pointing. All he saw was a blank sandstone wall, but beyond that, some miles in that direction, was a city of the modern age, real and populated. Shadi considered putting the Ring back and ignoring it. Chosen vessels were supposed to find their way into this hidden place, he wasn't supposed to deliver to them.

He sighed, it was a Millennium Item though, and even Shadi didn't truly understand them. He stepped forward and his foot came to rest within the city limits. He glanced down at the ring again as the spines adjusted their direction with the sudden change in position. He turned to the left and followed.

After a few minutes of walking, Shadi noted the spines twisting slowly to the right. Their target was moving. He adjusted and kept walking, monitoring the path the Millennium Ring was pointing out for him. When the spines very suddenly swung around to the left, Shadi paused and looked in the direction they were pointing.

His eyes were drawn to a foreigner wandering amid the crowd of locals. Shadi walked a wide circle, and the spines stayed locked on the foreigner. Shadi pressed his lips together and frowned softly. But the Eye had chosen a foreigner as well. He approached the foreigner slowly, keeping an eye on the Millennium Ring to make sure it hadn't been pointing to someone _near_ the man. It was insistent upon the foreigner and the moment Shadi stepped within two paces of him, the Millennium Ring went limp, seeming to become a perfectly ordinary piece of sculpture.

"Excuse me, sir," Shadi called, touching the man's shoulder.

"Oh! Er, hello," the foreigner said, turning around and looking a little startled. "Can I help you?"

Shadi nodded. "I am a hem netjer* and the guardian of a number of sacred objects," he explained, holding the Ring out towards the foreigner. "This object was restless, and I followed it to you. It has chosen you to be its owner."

The man's expression had gone quickly from politely attentive to thoroughly unimpressed very quickly as he listened to the explanation. "No thank you," he said when Shadi had finished. "It's lovely, but I'm not looking for souvenirs right now. I don't have my money with me."

"I'm not selling it," Shadi replied.

The foreigner gave him a suspicious look. "What do you mean?"

"I don't want your money. The item has chosen you and it is my duty to turn it over to the care of the one it chooses."

Now the foreigner just looked baffled.

"I assure you that I am not attempting to fool you, sir," Shadi said, and extended his arm a little more, pushing the Ring towards the foreigner.

"I- er- well," the man gingerly accepted the ring and stared down at it, suspicion being replaced by puzzlement. "But I still don't understand..."

Shadi silently returned to the tablet chamber while the man was speaking, before his eyes had lifted from their confused inspection of the Millennium Ring.

...

The outside sound was gone. The Millenium Ring was packed away somewhere well-padded and hidden from the sounds and smells and feelings of the outside world. And that left Bakhura and Sek alone again, trapped in that eternal dungeon, but awake, alert, waiting.

Bakhura chewed on his thumbnail and stared into the dark room, trembling; maybe it was the just the cold, or maybe it was anticipation. Sek circled him, sat over his lap and draped around his shoulders. _The time is coming to secure your revenge, Bakhura,_ the serpent hissed next to his ear.

Bakhura nodded. "Kemet..." he whispered. "... Destroy it..."

_The kingdom is gone,_ Sek told him softly. _The Pharaoh you faced before is all that's left of it._

"... Pharaoh…" Bakhura's eyes narrowed, his fingers slid against Sek's cold, slick scales. "... K-kill Pharaoh."

_No!_ Sek snapped. _He must not be killed before you have opened the __**gate**__. If you kill him, he is only one man, if you do as I say, all of Kemet will feel your wrath._

Bakhura nodded slowly and hugged Sek's body where it crossed his chest. It was icy cold and almost painful to touch, but it was his only companion, it always had been, and so he clung to it like a child to their mother's hand.

_Be patient, Bakhura. You must collect the keys and locate the Pharaoh when he awakens,_ Sek whispered. _And then Kul'elna will have its revenge. You have one key now, there are six more to find, and the last one will be with the Pharaoh._

He nodded again.

...

"I'm home!" Bakura Yasashiku called as he opened the door and then grinned with surprised delight to find his son already standing on the inner step, waiting for him. "Well good evening, Ryou! Were you a good boy for Grandma?"

"Ryou, don't you want to say 'welcome home' to Daddy?" Yasashiku's mother urged, lighting a hand on top of the boy's head as she came out from the kitchen.

Ryou stayed silent, as he had been since... but smiled at his father and held out his arms for a hug. Yasashiku rolled his suitcase inside and closed the door, then scooped his son up off the step into a big bear-hug. Ryou wrapped his arms around his father's neck and hugged tightly, not making a sound through the entire reunion.

"I brought you a souvenir, Ryou," Yasashiku said, balancing his son's weight against his hip and grinning at him.

Ryou tilted his head curiously while Yasashiku's mother laughed. "I have dinner ready for you, Shiku, you didn't eat on the plane, did you?"

"Nope, I'm starved!" Yasashiku said, putting Ryou back down on the step so that he could take off his shoes. Once in his house-shoes, he picked up his suitcase with one hand while Ryou caught the other and held it, and carried his suitcase upstairs to deposit in his room.

Yasashiku lifted the suitcase up to lay on his western-style bed and unlocked it. "Now hold on just a minute, I'll find your souvenir," he said, pulling out a stack of shirts and setting them down on the bed. Nestled right in the middle, between his shirts and his shorts, there was a blue paper bag with the top folded over neatly. Yasashiku pulled it out and squatted down next to his son, holding out the bag to him. "It's a mystical artifact!" he said with a grin. "I got it from a spooky priest, so maybe it's magical!"

Ryou accepted the gift with both hands and carefully pealed back the tape sticking down the folded-over part of the bag. He peaked inside and his eyebrows lifted with interest, then he reached one hand into the bag and pulled out a massive, ornate pendant.

"Is it okay?" Yasashiku asked, smiling at Ryou and petting his shoulder.

Ryou smiled back up at him and nodded, then stepped forward and gave his father another hug. Yasashiku laughed and lifted Ryou up again. He carried Ryou downstairs and made his way back to the kitchen where his mother was setting a meal on the table for him.

"What did Daddy give you, Ryou?" she asked, smiling at them and smoothing her apron. Yasashiku set Ryou down on his feet and the boy shuffled over to his grandmother holding up the pendant to show her. "That's very pretty, Ryou. I hope you said 'thank you' to Daddy," she said, straightening Ryou's hair a bit.

"He did," Yasashiku replied, sitting down at the table and picking up his fork. "Thanks for the delicious meal!"

Ryou had wandered behind the counter and Yasashiku could hear him rummaging through the junk drawer. A few moments later, the boy reappeared with a ball of kitchen twine and a pair of scissors. He walked over to his father and sat down hip-to-hip with him, almost making it difficult to eat, but the meal was mainly in small pieces and Yasashiku could manage his way through it without a knife, so he draped his left arm around Ryou and glanced down at his son between bites.

Ryou unrolled some of the twine and measured it, pulling it around behind his neck and holding the end in front of his chest, sliding it back and forth a bit until he seemed satisfied with the length. He then snipped it off the roll and knotted the ends together before slipping them through the top of the ring-pendant and looping them in place. He hung the lanyard around his neck and then looked up at his father, smiling.

Yasashiku chuckled and ruffled Ryou's hair. "It looks good on you," he affirmed.

Ryou smiled a bit wider and leaned against his father's side. Yasashiku curled his arm around Ryou's shoulders and smiled as he finished his supper. Even with Ryou's continued unnatural muteness, he felt serene and contented at this moment.

When he finished eating, Yasashiku looked down to see that Ryou had fallen asleep, slumped against him, the fingers of one hand curled around the large, metal ring, and the other balled around a bit of his father's shirt. Yasashiku smiled. "He must be all tired out," he said.

"That's odd," his mother said, pausing in her scrubbing of the rice-cooker to cast a concerned look over the counter. "He had a nap this afternoon, and I didn't think it was an especially strenuous day... I hope he didn't have a bad dream that kept him up last night."

Yasashiku's smile faded a bit as he stroked a hand through his son's hair. If a grown man was still having nightmares, what must it be like for a child? He shook that thought away and carefully gathered Ryou up into his arms. "I'll put him to bed," he told his mother quietly.

...

Ryou felt strangely cold. Not that it was strange that he was cold, but that he was cold in a very strange way he couldn't quite place. His eyes were closed and he seemed to be lying down, which was also strange because he didn't remember falling asleep. And then there were the voices.

_Perfect_, said something that wasn't exactly a voice. _This will be an ideal vessel._

"... K-kid," something that sounded much more like a normal voice responded in a doubtful tone.

_No, this is a fine age, he'll be infinitely more trainable than an adult, and he will grow quickly enough,_ the not-voice assured the mumbling one. _He is perfect._

"M-mm," reluctant assent.

Ryou lay very still. It must be a dream, because he'd been at home before he appeared here, so he must have fallen asleep. That was disappointing because he'd wanted to stay up later and play with daddy, but at least he knew he had to be safe. Daddy was there. So this was just a bad dream.

He felt fingers gingerly land on his face, but in that same moment he felt so many other things that the minor touch was almost drown out. Anxiety. Doubt. Anger, so much _anger_. Impatience. Need. Loss. Helplessness... Ryou gasped and opened his eyes, shocked by the sudden burst of emotions pouring into him. Someone above him, the owner of the voice that _was_ a voice, gasped in unison.

They were somewhere dark, very dark, and cold, maybe just a little damp or maybe that was only the cold. Ryou was laying on his back, staring up at someone, a stranger, crouched over him, startled and frightened just like Ryou. The stranger let out a scared little whimper.

_Be calm, Bakhura,_ the not-voice whispered. _It's just the bond._

Ryou cautiously sat up and turned his head, searching for the source of the not-voice, and he suddenly found himself nose-to-nose with the biggest snake he had ever seen. Ryou's eyes widened. It was even bigger than the snake at the zoo, and there wasn't any glass separating them. And unlike the one at the zoo, which had been criss-crossed with basket-like patterns of warm, soft browns and yellows, this one was blacker than new dress-shoes.

Ryou gasped again, terrified, not just by the fact of their being a hugely giant snake next to him, but also by its _glowing_ red eyes, like some horrible demon. He scraped his heels against the sandy stone floor, pushing himself away from the reptile and scrambled backwards just a short distance before he bumped into the stranger, whom he'd almost forgotten about.

The stranger let out a terrified squeak, and Ryou could feel his panic, which only served to make Ryou more afraid. The stranger grabbed Ryou and clung to him, which startled Ryou even more. Ryou turned his head and looked up at the stranger, confused. His first impression had been that the stranger was an adult, someone who would surely be in control of the situation, but now he was behaving like a small, frightened child.

_Do not let yourself be drawn in, Bakhura. He's only a child. You are stronger than him._

It had been a year and a half since someone had clung to Ryou like that, since he'd been a big brother. No one had sought out Ryou's hand for comfort or security when crossing the street since the accident. No one had come to him tearful in the night after a bad dream, whining to sleep in his bed. No one had wailed their woes of the kindergarten social hierarchy to him. But somehow, this stranger, whom Ryou had taken for an adult, was clinging to him as though asking to be protected, just the way Amane would have.

And for some reason, that made Ryou feel stronger. He reached and caught the stranger's hand, pushing himself to his feet and tugging at the stranger to follow.

_Bakhura..._ the snake hissed in a warning tone.

Ryou ducked down grabbing a handful of sand and throwing it at the snake as he started running, pulling the stranger behind him. The snake made an angry shriek that Ryou was pretty sure snakes shouldn't be able to make. Ryou didn't look back to see what it was doing, he just ran, dragging the stranger to the precarious little stairway wrapping around two sides of the room, leading up to a door.

_Bakhura! Stop!_ the snake shouted behind them.

Ryou told himself not to look back and climbed the stairs as quickly as he could. The door at the top looked like the kind of thing that would be locked, but Ryou was determined to be brave, and he wished as hard as he could that the door was unlocked. And then suddenly it was swinging open, before he'd even reached it. He heard the stranger gasp and felt a jolt of shock that belonged to the stranger.

_STOP!_

Ryou dragged the stranger through the door. He turned around after he'd pulled the stranger through and pressed his hands against the door, pushing at it. He could see the snake moving up the stairs, seeming to have some difficulty with the steps but still making headway. Ryou pushed as hard as he could on the door, which was dragging slowly, reluctantly, not closing fast enough. Then the stranger's hands landed next to Ryou's and the door swung shut under their combined weight, cutting off a loud, angry howl from the snake.

Ryou panted, his hands still pressed against the door. He felt damp with cold sweat and his legs were shaking. A strange giggle broke through the semi-silence and Ryou looked up to where the stranger was leaning against the door. The stranger let his knees buckle and slumped down to the floor with one shoulder and his head pressed against the old-looking wood. Ryou just watched him as he tried to catch his breath.

After a few minutes, it suddenly occurred to Ryou to wonder why it was lighter here than in the stone room. He turned away from the door to find another door right across from it. This door was entirely different from the scary, big, wood and metal one they'd just come through. This door was made of paper and light-colored wood, just like in Grandma's tatami room. Ryou considered it for a moment and then pushed away from the scary door and took a step towards the paper one.

A hand caught his and he looked back at the stranger. He was afraid; he was afraid of Ryou leaving him, of being left alone. Ryou wasn't sure why he knew that. He glanced at the paper door and then back at the stranger. He pointed to the paper door with his free hand.

The stranger's eyes followed his pointed finger and only then seemed to notice the paper door. He was cautiously curious now too. He pushed himself to his feet, without letting go of Ryou's hand, and followed as Ryou slid the door back and looked inside.

There was a tatami room inside, like Grandma's, except that it was much messier than Grandma's ever would have been. There were toys and books and pillows on the floor, like in the after-school day care room. Ryou wandered inside and explored the new room; the stranger continued to cling to his hand, and shuffled nervously after Ryou.

Ryou found a stuffed cat on the floor and he bent down to pick it up. He turned his face up to the stranger and held out the cat. The stranger was confused. Ryou gave the cat a one-armed hug to demonstrate and then pressed it to the stranger's chest. Reluctantly, the stranger let go of Ryou's hand and took the cat, hugging it warily, as though worried it might bite him, but once it was safely in his arms, they tightened possessively around it.

Ryou smiled at him, settling down on the floor and looking up at the stranger expectantly. The stranger gave him a startled look and took a step back, before very slowly crouching down and sitting carefully on the tatami, facing Ryou and looking suspicious. Ryou smiled gently and patted the stranger's knee, showing him that it was all right now, they were safe. The stranger slowly relaxed, the stuffed cat squeezed against him.

...

...

*Hem netjer- A priest whose primary function is to serve gods/goddesses and see to their needs.

Cultural Note: The reason Bakhura had disappeared when the old city was abandoned is that the people continuing to talk about you or read about you is vital in the Egyptian afterlife. Thus why Pharaohs put their names on everything and why heretic Pharaohs got their names scraped off of stuff.

Author's Note: So chapter six of FE is six and a half pages now and I've hit a little transition clog, trying to figure out how to wrap up that party and cross it off my list. Mainly in the "Shit, I have to kill about 10 hours now before I can attach the ending and I just made shit really awkward so it would be stupid to just throw it back into tourism mode…" So that's where I am, progress on FE is still chugging along while I'm posting all these other bits, it's just got cramps or something.

Shanananana- Oh, so- I originally started this fic shortly after I wrote Making Choices, and once again, of course, I planned it as a one shot and then got all mad when I noticed that I was 17 pages in. So I've broken up my timeline a bit, but I still hope this won't end up as epic as Interlude or FE. So more recently (this week) I reread what I wrote back in the beginning of summer and went "Geh! This is dumb and won't fit in the 'verse anymore!" So only two of the scenes here (the last two) are taken (and modified) from what I originally wrote, and the rest are new.

I'd say that the biggest modification I made was in Bakhura's speech. When I originally wrote it, I gave him a level of lucidity more like the he has in Deal with the Devil, so he was confused and switching sentences halfway through and being generally wiggy. My interpretation of his mental state at this period has changed a bit through the course of Interlude and FE- and in chapter two of FE I described Bakhura having been in a much rawer state when he first met Ryou. So I decided I wanted to give him more the emotional and behavioral responses of an abused dog rather than the ability to reason (even if it's paranoid or crazy reasoning) associated with a human. Ryou's trauma-muteness, on the other hand, was part of the first draft, and now I'm kind of terrified that I've set myself up to write this fic with next to no dialog. Shit! That's going to be _hard!_


	2. Lesson Two: Start fights in school

"Hey Ba-kun, what's that?" Chiyo asked, sitting backwards in her chair with her knees tucked up under her. She was pointing at the Egyptian souvenir from Daddy, hanging from Ryou's neck. He smiled at her and lifted it up so she could see it better. "_Pretty!_"

"Cool!" Harue exclaimed, popping up next to Ryou's desk. "It looks _old!_ Where'd you get it?"

"He's not going to _answer_ you," Itsuki scoffed from the neighboring desk, not looking up from his gameboy. "That retard can't even talk."

"Ba-kun's _not_ a retard and he can talk just _fine!_"Chiyo snapped indignantly. "He just doesn't _want_ to!"

Ryou examined the top of his desk raptly and made no auditory or gestural response, waiting patiently until the teacher would arrive and call class to order. Before that could happen, Chiyo's hands landed on his desk and he looked up to find her leaned over his desk and right in his face. "Hey, Ba-kun, your dad went to Egypt, right? Is that a souvenir from Egypt?"

He gave her a small smile and nodded.

Chiyo giggled and thankfully plopped back down into her seat. "I was right! It's from Egypt!" she declared triumphantly, then turned to Itsuke and stuck out her tongue.

"Cool!" Harue said again, looking impressed. "Hey Ryou, let me see!" He reached out to grab for the pendant.

As Harue's fingers closed around the ring of it, a sudden hurricane of _fear-rage-jealousy-panic_ surged through Ryou and his own hand swung out and slammed into Harue's face not a split-second later.

"DON'T TOUCH ME!"

There was sudden silence. Ryou was trembling and the palm of his hand stung. Harue was holding his cheek and staring at Ryou wide-eyed. Ahead of Ryou's desk, Chiyo was frozen, still backwards in her seat, her eyes also wide with shock. Everyone in the room was staring at him.

... Was he the one who had just screamed?

Ryou shoved himself out of his chair and stumbled a little before running down the row of desks and toward the door. Yoshida-sensei appeared in the door at that moment, walking into the classroom, blocking his escape. Ryou veered to the right and slid around her, grabbing the door frame and using it to launch himself through and out into the hall, running as fast as he could.

He heard Yoshida-sensei yell after him, but he ignored it and kept running, his heart thumping and his mind blank of nearly all thoughts except panic and the need to escape. Around the corner he spotted a water fountain recessed into the wall and the space under it looked just big enough for him to fit into. He dove for the hiding-place and tucked himself quickly inside, pulling his knees up to his chin and hugging his arms around them.

What had just happened? Why had he hit Harue? Had he really just screamed? What had even prompted him to do it? All of a sudden he'd just been so scared of Harue touching his souvenir, but _why?_

He was going to be in trouble. He'd hit another student and he'd left class without permission. He sighed and leaned his forehead against his knees. What was wrong with him? And what was that strange sensation of something tugging at him? Like dozens of invisible threads pulling at him, trying to pull him down through the floor.

Somebody crashed into him and Ryou panicked. He'd been caught! But how could he have been knocked over? He'd had walls supporting him from three sides. He blinked up at the ceiling and slowly realized that the light was wrong. The body that had crashed into his was now clinging to him in a desperate sort of hug.

Ryou rolled his head to the side to see paper walls and a tatami floor strewn with toys. He was in the playroom again. He slowly tried to push himself up, to look at the person clinging to him, the stranger from last night? The body against him -a child, the same size as Ryou- moved to adjust to their changing position without loosening their arms from the grip around Ryou's waist. Then the face slowly turned up to look back at him.

Ryou stared. He closed his eyes and opened them again and it didn't seem to change anything. He was looking at himself. A mirror-perfect copy. But there in the eyes, the expression, the anxious, mistrustful yet hopeful look -like a dog that was sure it would be kicked if it accepted the treat it was being offered- Ryou could see that it was definitely the stranger from before.

The stranger hadn't looked like him before had he? Ryou tried to remember what the stranger had looked like last night but he kept coming up with a blank. The stranger hadn't looked like _anything_ last night. He'd looked like a person, of course, but a person who wasn't anyone at all.

Ryou slowly lifted his hand and patted the stranger's hair. The stranger watched him for a moment and then moved suddenly, raising to his knees and grabbing at Ryou, almost knocking him back down. "It's_ mine!_" the stranger declared.

Ryou blinked a few times and realized that the stranger had grabbed the souvenir from Daddy, and was holding it possessively near his own chest, even while the lanyard was still around Ryou's neck.

"He c-can't ha-have it!" the stranger insisted. "It's _mine!_"

Ryou nodded slowly and the stranger seemed to relax. He let the pendant again rest back against Ryou's chest -apparently he didn't want to wear it as part of his declared ownership over the object- and sank down to his haunches, staring at Ryou. Ryou looked back at him and thought. He'd known what the stranger was feeling last night; he'd _felt_ the strangers feelings. Was it the stranger's anger that had made him hit Harue?

Yes. That was it. The oddest feeling when Harue had touched the pendant, jealousy, wasn't Ryou's, and he could still see the vestiges of it in the stranger's eyes. He'd been afraid Harue wasn't going to give it back, that he'd take it from Ryou and keep it for himself, and... that would be terrible for some reason, not just because it would be cruel but... something more.

What was so important about the pendant?

The pendant... must have brought him here. He'd come last night right after putting it on and he'd come here now when the stranger felt that the pendant was in danger. This room, was it somehow _inside_ of the pendant?

The stranger pushed his weight up on his knees again and Ryou watched him curiously as the stranger crawled right up on top of Ryou and threw his arms back around Ryou's body. Ryou was tipped over backwards into the floor again, but this time he landed on a large, soft pillow. Wasn't this the very same place he'd fallen before? When had the pillow gotten there?

They stayed still there, Ryou in the pillow and the stranger laying on top of him, clinging to him and breathing slowly. A long time seemed to pass, and then the silence was momentarily broken. "You- y'er warm," the stranger whispered.

...

Ryou opened his eyes and saw the generic ceiling tiles of his school staring back at him from above. He sat up and looked around to find that he was occupying a cot in the school nurse's office. He could see the nurse at her desk, writing in a three-ring binder.

He slid his feet to the floor and walked over to her. As he approached she looked up and turned around in her chair to see him. She smiled. "Ah, Ryou-kun, you're awake. That's wonderful," she said. "I've called your grandmother and she's coming here to get you. You've been excused from class today, so you can go home and rest."

Ryou tilted his head to the side a bit, giving her a baffled frown. He wasn't ill. He should be in the principal's office because he'd hit another student, not in the _nurse's_ office.

"It's nothing to worry about, Bakura-kun. You don't have a fever and you seem quite normal. You just need to rest a bit and I'm sure you'll be right as rain." The nurse stood up and put a hand gently on his shoulder, leading him back towards the cot. "Now why don't you just lay down until your grandmother gets here."

...

Grandma sat Ryou on the couch with a blanket and made him eat rice-porridge and sick foods while watching the preschooler cartoons that played during school hours on the television. He was well bored by afternoon, but if he tried to walk upstairs to get a book or toy, his grandmother would shoo him back onto the couch and insist that he needed to stay put and rest. He gave up and pulled the blanket over his head, hiding in the warm, little cave it created.

He turned on his side and picked up the pendant, holding it between his hands and studying it. There was a room inside of this. Two rooms at least, maybe more. It really was a magical pendant like Daddy had said. Ryou thought he'd been joking then, but it must really have come from a mysterious priest after all.

So how did he go in and out of it? When he'd gone into it before, he'd done it by accident, and he seemed to have come back out of it when he fell asleep. He thought he'd rather be in the playroom right now than stuck on the couch without anything to do. Perhaps he could figure out how to get there on purpose.

Nobody seemed to have got upset about him disappearing. Grandma had said that he fell asleep very early last night and the nurse said that he'd fainted in the hallway. So his body must stay behind and pretend to be sleeping when he went into the playroom.

He'd had his eyes closed under the water fountain before he got there today, maybe he had to close his eyes. So he did; he closed his eyes and held the pendant against his chest. He made a picture of the playroom in his mind and thought very hard about being there. Then he opened his eyes.

The stranger was crouched in a corner of the room but he leapt to his feet as soon as Ryou's eyes had opened and ran over to him, discarding the stuffed cat on the floor. Ryou sat up and smiled, pleased with himself for his accomplishment of arriving on purpose. The stranger sat down right in front of him, crossing his legs, and looking at Ryou. Ryou gave him a smile as well and the stranger looked pleased.

It seemed as though the stranger was waiting for him to decide what to do, so Ryou pushed himself to his feet and looked around the room. The stranger caught Ryou's hand and held it, Ryou glanced back and gave him another smile and then lead him over to the small, bright green table that had sheets of paper and a box of pencils neatly arranged on it. It was the only properly neat thing in the room, and Ryou appreciated it, he hated having to pick up a table before he could draw on it.

He knelt down and the stranger followed suit right next to him. Ryou pulled a sheet of paper and a blue pencil in front of him and supposed he was glad the stranger had decided to hold his left hand and not the right. He thought for a minute and then started drawing a crane, like in the book of Chinese paintings on grandma's shelf. After a few minutes, he turned to the stranger and smiled. Ryou pulled a second piece of paper beside his and held out the pencil to the stranger.

The stranger slowly relinquished Ryou's hand and reached out for the pencil, hesitantly, as though he expected it to burn him. It did not. Ryou went back to his drawing and looked up again after a few more minutes to look at the stranger's picture. It was a lot of small pictures stacked on top of each other, like the pictures in the Egypt book daddy had given Ryou before he left. Hieroglyphics.

Ryou leaned over and looked more closely, which seemed to make the stranger anxious. He stopped drawing and fidgeted uncomfortably, Ryou gave him another encouraging smile and he relaxed a bit. Ryou looked at the hieroglyphics again and noted that the stranger seemed to be repeating the same set of symbols in different colors. It was pretty, Ryou decided, maybe he should try it with calligraphy.

...

"I'm home!" Yasashiku called as he stepped in the door.

"Oh, Shiku!" His mother's voice was agitated and he could hear her hurrying out to meet him.

"What's wrong?" Yasashiku asked, pushing his shoes off quickly and stepping up into the hall.

"It's Ryou! The school called me today because he _fainted!_" his mother said, ringing her hands. "He's been sleeping all afternoon, but the school nurse said that there's nothing wrong with him."

"He _fainted?_" Yasashiku asked. He'd never heard that one before; scrapes and bruises, yes, once in the first grade he'd even thrown-up at school, but he'd never _fainted_.

"That's not all of it," his mother said shaking her head. "I didn't talk to his teacher because she was busy with her class, but the nurse said she was told that Ryou hit one of his friends unprovoked, shouted at him and then ran away out of the classroom."

Yasashiku stared at her. "He _shouted?_"

His mother nodded, biting her lip and then scowled. "How could that nurse say that there was nothing wrong with him? Children don't just _faint_ and Ryou has _never_ been violent!"

"... What did he yell?" Yasashiku asked softly.

"Oh I don't _know!_" his mother wailed.

"_Mom!_"

"She didn't _say!_"

Yasashiku ran a hand through his hair, shaking his head. "Where is he now?" he asked.

"On the sofa," his mother answered gesturing toward the living room.

"Okay," Yasashiku said, hanging his coat on the hook. "I'll talk to him."

...

The stranger was half laying in Ryou's lap, his cheek rested against Ryou's stomach and his face turned to watch his raised hand, covered in a felt alligator puppet, as it interacted with Ryou's horse puppet. He giggled, opening and closing the puppet's mouth and shaking it to make its arms flail out. Ryou reached out the horse and made it bite the alligator's snout. The stranger laughed, kicking his feet in the air a little and clinging to Ryou with his other arm.

Ryou brought the puppet down to attack the stranger's face. The stranger shrieked and giggled, squirming and trying to fend off Ryou with the alligator. It was strange... last night Ryou had thought the stranger looked like an adult, and now he looked nine, but he acted younger, more like a kindergartener. Ryou had been wondering all afternoon what the stranger _was_ and how he had gotten inside the magic pendant.

_Ryou... Wake up, honey..._

Ryou paused, tangled on the floor with the stranger, who he'd been tickling, and looked around. The stranger kept giggling, not seeming to have heard Daddy's voice just now. Ryou sat up slowly and the stranger rolled on his back to look up at him curiously.

_Ryou, come on…_

Ryou looked up at the room's ceiling, it seemed as though Daddy's voice was coming from above. It also sounded strange and far away, like it was coming through a bad telephone connection. The stranger had heard it this time too and sat up next to Ryou, biting his lip and fidgeting. He reached out and grabbed Ryou's shirt when Ryou pushed himself up, giving him a pleading look.

The stranger didn't want to be left alone. But Daddy was calling for Ryou, and he couldn't stay in the playroom forever. He smiled softly at the stranger and knelt back down next to him. He found the stuffed cat within arm's reach -although he seemed to recall the stranger dropping it in the corner earlier- and picked it up, handing it to the stranger. The stranger slowly hugged the cat, still giving Ryou a please-don't-leave-me look. Ryou patted the stranger's head gently and kissed his forehead, before getting back to his feet.

Daddy's voice was coming from above, and so Ryou figured the way back out of the pendant must be up. He stared up at the ceiling and tried to figure out how to go there, but even as he did, he felt himself drifting, almost like floating up through water, as the ceiling faded into darkness. Then he opened his eyes and he was on the couch, with Daddy sitting next to him and looking worried.

Daddy smiled, though he still looked worried. "Hey there, sport," he said, brushing at Ryou's hair with his fingers. "You were sleeping pretty deep. Having a dream?"

Ryou thought about it. No. He was quite sure that the playroom wasn't a dream now. He shook his head. Daddy nodded, still wearing the worried-but-trying-not-to-look-worried smile. "How do you feel? Are you okay?"

Ryou nodded easily and then pushed himself up. He let out a sigh as he stretched a little and then looked up at Daddy with a happy smile for a moment before leaning forward and hugging him. Daddy petted Ryou's hair. "It's dinner time. Are you hungry?"

Ryou nodded again, letting go and crawling out from under the blanket before sliding off the couch.

...

Bakhura sat silently on the floor, hugging his cat and staring blankly ahead of him.

The boy had gone outside again. He lived outside. Bakhura had lived outside before, a long time ago. He wished he could follow the boy there, or that the boy would stay here.

It was nice here.

He'd been in this room for a while, maybe a day or more, as the boy went in and out. He'd slept part of the time, but he still felt tired. And lonely. This place was warm, but when the boy wasn't there, it was too empty.

Bakhura glanced over to the sliding door made of light, soft stuff that wasn't unlike (but wasn't really _like_ either) papyrus. Outside of that was his door, and on the other side Sek was waiting for him. He'd probably be angry. Bakhura shuddered, hugging the cat a little tighter.

Sek would probably only get angrier the longer Bakhura stayed away. And he was lonely. He wanted to be with the boy, but the boy had gone where Bakhura couldn't reach him, and Sek was just on the other side of the door. Sighing and shivering a little, Bakhura climbed to his feet and padded over to the door, hugging his cat to him with one arm as he reached the other out to grab the wooden part of the door and slide it back.

The hallway outside was dark, and right ahead of him was the thick, heavy wooden door that lead to the prison. Bakhura swallowed, his throat feeling dry, and curled his toes nervously, then he stepped out into the hall, the stone floor feeling much colder than the woven mats in the boy's room, and touched the door to his own room. He could hear locks clicking and sliding inside of it, and then it swung slowly out towards him. Cold poured out of it and Bakhura started shivering before he'd even stepped over the threshold.

_Bakhura,_ Sek's voice greeted him quietly from below.

Bakhura bit his lip and wrapped both arms around his cat again. He took another step deeper into the room and then felt a rush of air and heard the crash of the door slamming shut behind him. He curled his toes and shivered, listening to the locks all resetting themselves.

_Come here,_ Sek commanded, and slowly Bakhura started to descend the narrow stone steps. Sek was waiting for him when he stepped off the last one and circled around Bakhura, twisting and climbing up around him and bringing its head to rest near Bakhura's ear. _I'm glad you were clever enough to come back on your own,_ it said quietly.

"Y-y're- a-aren't m-mad?" Bakhura whispered through chattering teeth.

_I was... concerned,_ Sek said. _It is dangerous for you to spend too much time in that boy's mind, Bakhura. You grow weak if you stay too long away from your sahu._

Bakhura nodded slowly.

_But it is good that you are acquainting yourself with our host, Bakhura._ Sek seemed to consider the cat for a moment before deciding to ignore it. _His cooperation will be important. And for now we are waiting. It may be several years before we find the Pharaoh's host. This time should be spent training the boy._

Bakhura bit his lip and looked at the ground. He wasn't sure he liked that. It seemed... wrong.

_Relax, my servant,_ Sek whispered in his ear. _Play with your new friend. Bond with him. Teach him to hate the Pharaoh as you do..._

That didn't sound bad. It sounded good, actually. Friend. Bakhura had a friend. He smiled hesitantly at that thought.

...

After Ryou had bathed and put on his pajamas, Daddy read to him from a book of Egyptian stories he had brought back. It was a story about Isis staying in the home of a poor woman while she was traveling, because a rich woman had refused to let her in. Later Isis had healed the rich woman's baby after he was stung by a scorpion. Ryou leaned against Daddy's side and looked at the illustrations, which were drawn like hieroglyphs, as Daddy read. He liked the story; most fairy tales had angry gods who punished people for being rude to them, but Isis was nice and forgave the rich woman.

When the story was over, Ryou climbed under his covers and Daddy tucked him in. It had been a few months since Daddy had tucked him in and he was happy that Daddy was going to be home for almost two weeks this time. He petted Ryou's hair and smiled at him, but that worried look came back just a bit and Ryou's smile faded to a questioning look.

"Grandma told me something happened at school today," Daddy said quietly.

Ryou bit his lip, looking away guiltily, and after a moment, nodded.

"Did you hit one of your friends?" Daddy asked.

Ryou nodded again, squirming a bit under his covers.

"Did he make you angry?"

Ryou shook his head this time and looked at Daddy's arm, not quite having the courage to look him in the eye yet.

"Do you know why you hit him?" Daddy stroked his hand over Ryou's hair again and Ryou hesitantly lifted his eyes to meet his father's. He bit his lip, his eyebrows drawn together and felt a little helpless. He thought that it was the stranger's anger that had made him hit Harue, but he wasn't really sure how the stranger's anger had gotten into him, or even what the stranger was.

"... Okay," Daddy said quietly, and gave Ryou a weak, little smile. "It's okay, Ryou. Sometimes if we've been trying not to be angry for a long time, it can come out unexpectedly like that." He brushed his thumb against Ryou's forehead. "I know you miss Mom and Amane, and it's not fair what happened... It's okay to be angry. Don't let anyone tell you you shouldn't be. You take as long as you need to, and when you're ready to tell me about it, we can talk."

He leaned down and kissed Ryou on the forehead. Ryou's eyes burned a little, like he might cry; he wasn't sure if he felt guilty or sad or relieved that Daddy wasn't angry. Daddy never got angry or frustrated with Ryou the way other adults did.

Ryou watched him turn off the light and step out into the hall, calling "Good night, Ryou," before he pulled the door shut behind him. He wished Daddy would come home every day, like he used to.

...

...

The first time I wrote this, the first scene of this chapter I kind of switched perspectives halfway through to the teacher's point of view. It worked as far as the flow of activity went, but I don't like flipping mid-scene like that, so I ended up redoing it entirely from Ryou's perspective and it worked pretty well. The other major change in the rewrite of that scene was the dialog between the kids, because on reread, I realized that they sounded more like five or six-year-olds than nine-year-olds. Originally I made Chiyo as a one-shot character just for that scene, but I've decided to keep her around for future plot a couple years down the road here. I doubt I'll use Itsuki again since he's obviously not Ryou's friend, but maybe Harue will come back.

The first draft of the playroom scene when Ryou's on the couch at home was kinda... dumb. I'm a lot happier with how it turned out this time. A lot of the problem was that I was putting more on the telepathic link when I first wrote it because I didn't have the confidence to write the Bakurae interaction without dialog; taking the time to properly work around the lack of dialog instead of half-assing it is making things a lot better. Also, I've made Bakhura a lot more abused-puppy in this version, whereas I originally had him just kind of ADD and stuff. A lot of these changes are based on the paragraph I wrote about this period in a chapter of Final Eclipse, because the first-draft I keep referring to here was written a couple months before FE, and then when I went back to look at it after writing through a lot of FE, I realized that I liked the more traumatized version of Bakhura I'd mentioned there.

So now we're up to the equivalent of where I left off on that first-draft and what I plug out from here on is going to be totally new material. I do have plans, oh the plans I have, but none of them have been committed to text yet.

So anyway, please comment/review and give me the inspiration to keep on trucking.


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